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right now less than 30 minutes and counting until a major change goes into effect on the roads, in and out of new york city. just trying to cope with the snow, how some residents have gotten creative after washington, d.c., got two feet of snow, and do you know what? it's not over yet. believe it or not more snow is in the works. hi, everybody, i'm thomas roberts live in new york city at msnbc world headquarters. we've got big developments to talk about this hour with new york city getting hit very hard by today's massive snowstorm and when it's all over the city could end up with more than 2 1/2 feet of snow on the ground a new record and if you have to travel in the city you're running out of time. governor andrew cuomo and the mayor bill de blasio have put a travel ban in place and the ban covers new york city and nassau county roads as well as port authority crossings to new jersey. the ban goes into effect at 2:30 p.m. and commuter trains in and out of the city will begin to shut down at 4:00 p.m. and above-ground subways in the city will also shut down at 4:00.

bus service has already been shuttered. and just look at this, more than 40,000 along jersey's coast without power. new jersey's governor chris christie has just declared a state of emergency and has urged residents to stay put. we have the nation's capital, also at a standstill this hour. heavy snow continuing this afternoon. wind gusts of 40 miles per hour reducing visibility to near zero. the storm is blamed for at least ten deaths in four states some in traffic accidents along some very icy roads. here, take a look at the boards as air traffic has been ground to a halt with more than 7,800 flights canceled today alone, all flights have been canceled from airports from washington, baltimore and philadelphia. we've got a series of reports with correspondents in the hardest-hit areas and adam reis in central park and luke russert is in washington, d.c.,'s freedom plaza, but we begin with bill karins with more on the

latest storm warnings. bill, what are you watching? >> well, thomas, getting all the new updates from the airports. they report every six hours and we're figuring out the numbers. reagan got an inch in the last six hours and a dry slot and they're only up to 15 inches of snow. if you look at the philadelphia airport they reported with 18 inches of snow, the closest big city now to the 20-inch mark. and new york city and d.c. are neck and neck, who would have guessed that 24 to 36 hours ago. both are reporting 15 inches of snow. still haven't heard the report from our friends in baltimore so we're waiting on that one. the other areas have got significant maybe historic snow, laguardia airport reporting in at 17 inches of snow. laguardia gets one more inch it will be the second biggest snowfall on record at laguardia airport. that airport observations have been around for a long time. central park has a longer ways to go because they had thunder snow in 2006 that got them up to 26 1/2 inches of snow so i don't know if we'll get to that kind of threshold but we may come close to it.

so that's the kind of stuff we've been watching here. want to go to al roker and have been doing roker-a-thon since this morning. it's still gangbuster. >> we've got a ways to go, still, as you watch. look at this, you can see we still have heavy snow here in new york city. also long island and it's just going to hang around for a while. then we slide our way down to -- oh, i'm sorry, hit the wrong thing there. we work our way over toward philadelphia and you can see now we've got some dry slots coming in as we've been talking about, so we're going to be watching this now. and we put in some -- some queries to ask about some snow and see what we've got going on. like, out on nassau county, heavy snow? hollis hills, that's actually queens, 13.9 inches of snow and jfk 14.6 with heavy snow, we'll be watching this coming down. here we go with what we're expecting. we've updated our snowfall amounts. we are talking 24 inches or more

in the washington area. the heavy snow continues today with wind gusts 50 miles per hour. we actually have a hurricane-force wind warning from point pleasant, new jersey, all the way to delmarva peninsula. philadelphia, heavy snow this afternoon 18 to 24 inches with wind gusts of 40 miles per hour. new york city, yesterday if you were with us, we were talking 6 to 12, and now we're looking 24 plus possible with wind gusts of 55 miles per hour. that will continue into the evening. we had really not expected part of connecticut or massachusetts to really be involved much but 8 to 12 for new haven. we're looking at providence with 3 to 6 and boston yesterday, bill, we were talking what, zero to 2 maybe? >> maybe. and they're still right on the line. >> they're still right on the line. >> one of the directors working on the show came in from poughkeepsie and he showed one of the pictures not a flake. nothing. he drives into a city that's shut down. how's that for a commute? that's how hard of a forecast it

was. >> luckily he got in before 2:30 because new york city police department saying if you are caught on the road driving in a nonemergency vehicle you will be arrested. >> and the last thing you had there on the map was the coastal threat. right now we're at peak low tide and if people are very nervous because now we'll start bringing the water back in. >> we'll see what happens. some of the pictures you've been showing and we've been showing just amazing to see. we've got another high tide tomorrow morning and by then hopefully the winds will have died down a bit so it won't be all quite that bad. >> it gets to the area in the storm we're wrapping up the forecast of it and stuff and i'm happy to report i finally had a second to look at the long-range stuff there's a big warm-up coming the next week or two across the entire country so -- >> luckily it's not a fast warm-up because we're worried about all this snow. where all this snow goes. >> nice, steady snow melt as we head into february. >> all right. there you go. back to you, thomas. >> bill, al, real quickly, though, it's the concern of the high tide tonight because of the full moon, right? the low-lying area.

>> it added about a foot and a half this morning, thomas, a little less than this evening. but the wind direction's a little different. this morning -- this is the current winds. it's still plowing in right now but slowly as the storm begins to pull away hopefully the winds will be a little bit more parallel to the coast out of the north instead of the east-northeast and it makes the tiniest little difference but it's a difference between piling up instead of pushing it down the coast. >> yep. >> thank you, both. nbc's luke russert is in the nation's capital which has already seen more than a foot of snow. luke, it's still coming down. so, what are the -- i guess, what are the concerns that people in d.c. are saying about the ever-growing amount of snow? >> reporter: yeah, hi there, thomas. it's been falling pretty steadily since about 4:00 p.m. yesterday and it kind of tapered off a little bit for our last few reports about an hour, hour and a half ago. now, well, it's starting back up again, as you can see. this strong wind blowing this

snow in my face and behind me. the real concern from the mayor, mayor bowser here, two things. number one, people going back out on the street. the mayor imploring folks, please, do not drive. if you are driving, please have an suv. do not get on the street with the a compact car, you are going to interrupt our plowing and present yourself as a danger to the emergency vehicles that need access to the roads. number two, if you are just a citizen and you want to walk downtown and take some instagram shots, it's not safe to walk on the streets. there's cars moving. emergency vehicles moving. plows moving. do not do that. please, if you are going to go outside, stick to the sidewalk, trudge through, do what you can. one thing, though, thomas, so far where d.c. has gotten lucky, there's a lot of concern about the possibility of power outages. some of them that could last three, four, five days. because this snow -- as i'll pick it up here, very light and fluffy stuff, all right?

that has not caused a lot of tree branches to break those above ground power lines. so, from what we know from pepco, the local municipality here, they only have a few slight outages in the surrounding suburbs of washington, d.c. if that holds up, then d.c. officials feel they have dodged a huge bullet, and then it's a dig-out process that starts on sunday. but that dig-out process goes a lot more smoothly if everybody has power. as to when this city will get back on its feet, that's a good question. as a lifelong resident i know d.c. very well, if you look at these totals, they look pretty significant. i don't see us getting back to work on monday. probably until tuesday. the other big aspect is the drifts. you are seeing the snow accumulate at a higher rate because of the winds. especially the places that have not been plowed, those drifts will get substantially higher by the time we get to the evening hours when this storm finally

tapers off in washington, thomas? >> customer of pepco, good news that they maintain power. luke, thank you so much. i want to turn from our colleague in new york city, we're 21 minutes away from the travel ban taking effect with the city's mayor calling this one of the worst snowstorms in the city's history. let's check in with adam reis, he's in central park and it's not stopping folks from coming out trying to enjoy what the snow brings. adam, what are you seeing? >> reporter: that's true, thomas, but we're continuing to get pounded with the snow. blizzardlike conditions, it might not be technically a blizzard but it feels like one getting hit in the face all morning long. now, the snow is continuing. we expect it to continue through tomorrow afternoon in these blizzardlike conditions. the city, as you mentioned earlier, essentially shut down. the bus service shut down. long island railroad, metro north. i've got kevin joining me here. he's got his two adorable sons

here. they are suffering from the conditions. but, kevin, you are enjoying it, right? >> we are enjoying it. i couldn't think of a better time than this to be out with the two young guys. i know the city is shut down, but, boy, i tell you, it's really provided a joyful play date for us. >> reporter: sure. what do you make when you come to central park? you don't get to see it like this that often. >> you don't. but i tell you, we thought that winter was never going to come and now it's really come with a vengeance. >> reporter: oh, yeah. you guys enjoy. i bet once you get sledding they'll really have a good time. but, thomas, i must mention, there are people enjoying the weather here, the sledders, the skiers. i've even seen people out here on bikes. but the mayor has declared this a winter snow emergency and that means they're on high alert. all the agencies have been activated here in the city. they've got some 6,000 miles that they need to pave, all throughout today and tomorrow as this snow continues to come down. but, again, we have to keep an eye on the flooding. not only here in new york but in

new jersey where governor christie has declared a state of emergency. but, again, thomas, back here in central park, people are enjoying this snow and taking advantage of this beautiful, white winter weather -- wonderland. >> yeah, we see kevin with his kids, 50/50 with the kids there having a fun time in the snow is not bad. so, we hope everybody stays safe and enjoys it. adam, we'll check back with you in a little while. thank you, sir. this massive storm is causing serious flooding in several towns along the jersey shore. the water is rising so quickly, so high, it's even reached the parking meters in certain areas. i want to check in with rehema ellis in point pleasant, new jersey. >> reporter: here along the jersey coast, and that is high winds -- up to 50 miles per hour. we've got the water -- powerful -- and -- concern of -- erosion that's going to occur here as well as the potential for flooding. the governor of new jersey,

chris christie, has declared a state of emergency because they expect up to two feet of snow in some parts of new jersey. they say, however, here along the coastline it may only be between 8 and 12 inches of snow. i have to tell you, the tide right now is not nearly as high as it was early this morning but what we see and what i feel coming at me is not just something that feels like sleet, but it also feels like sand. and we see a lot of it. if we can pan the camera just a little bit off of me and on to the ocean. you see these waves out there. while, they are high and at one point they were about four feet high, they seem to have settled just a little bit. but i must tell you that the winds haven't settled much at all. it's really fierce out here. concerns about flooding. governor christie says at some point about 40,000 people in the area have been without power. they're doing the best they can to try to get the power up as soon as they can. but the word right now is that

they hope everyone who can stay in place in home will do that until this storm abates. because they need to get these road crews out on the roads and clearing everything as fast as they possibly can. but, again, wind is the real problem here along the coast. and this is expected to last at least a while longer. thomas, back to you. >> rehema ellis reporting in new jersey under pretty harsh conditions. we'll talk to her late. up next we're talking about the travel delays, the cancellations and the ripple effect up and down the eastern seaboard and how long it could take to get flights and travelers back on schedule. also the story behind some incredible pictures of this storm tweeted from the international space station. plus, the ways people are dealing with the snow. they're getting creative. >> how's the powder? >> it's cake and plain. it's better than nothing. it's a good workout. i needed to get back into shape

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all right. so this it the weather story affecting millions right this point. you're looking at live pictures as the snow comes down outside m.snbc world headquarters the efforts of road clearing is being thwarted by the amount of snow coming down. and we have a travel ban going into effect in the city in roughly 12 minutes. in washington, d.c., more than a foot of snow has fallen there and you can see some people have taken advantage of that opportunity. look at that two guys snowboarding while being toed by a 4x4 near capitol hill and when it's all two feet of snow are expected to be on the ground there. that's not something you see every winter. msnbc meteorologist bill karins here. >> nor recommend.

>> i wouldn't recommend it either. >> it's always, like, young males doing the things. >> the other guy with the door open as he's trying to shoot them. as we talk about it, some folks are having fun, but there are some concerns with the travel ban going into effect in new york city. >> two days ago we had the thing in d.c. an inch of snow go through and everyone was on the roads and it was a problem but this was a well advertised huge storm and everyone knows to stay off the roads and everyone is. when you see pictures of, like, really crowded places with no one in it it's kind of, like, an eerie feeling the entransto the george washington briz and the toll plazas and new york city shutting down. there's no one out there as all and that's where it's been snowing hard. there's goes one or two cars heading towards jersey out of new york city. the other shot this is from dillon dryer trying to make her way up from washington, d.c., this morning from new york city. i'm not so sure she's going to make it. she only has ten minutes left to

get into new york city and you can see her travel's gotten worse the further north up in new jersey. she was in a snow hole, a dry slot around philadelphia, the roads were cleared out, but not so much the roads are packed right now and the wind looks like it's blowing pretty well and the snow moderate. take you a little bit of an overview of the storm. d.c. you still have a little band of snow to go through. the snow is starting to end. there's the back edge all the way back south of pittsburgh but this will move towards the coast the rest of this evening. the heavy band of snow is in northern maryland back up through central, northern jersey, back to new york just north of new york city along the connecticut coast and pretty good bands down there along the south shores of massachusetts and throughout the cape and the islands also. as far as the pictures went this morning, sea isle city, the morning high tide was horrendous. we don't think it will be quite as bad but some additional damage is possible. when you see additional pictures

like this coming in, you see the slushy storm, y don't normally get it with hurricanes usually with winter storms and it's here in all the businesses. a lot of restaurant and bars around these areas had water in them and they'll have to go in in the days ahead and they only have four months until the busy season hits. when sandy hit it was the end of october, beginning of november they had a little additional time and it will be a crunch trying to get all the places cleaned up and the water out of them and pull the carpets and do that sort of stuff and that's not fun and that's what they'll be dealing with as far as snow totals go we finally got the totals in for philadelphia. philadelphia and baltimore now are both right around 15 inches of snow. so that's -- or excuse me, 18 inches. d.c., new york are at 15. baltimore and philadelphia at 18. there's baltimore, too. and, you know, baltimore and philadelphia, you know, we don't talk about them as much in between the nation's capital and the biggest city up here in new york but very impressive snowfall totals for those cities

also. >> my aunt sent me a picture from their back porch and they've got 20 inches as well and they've definitely gotten hit by the storm. that's our baltimore producers, bill, they have been sending me pictures. >> if anyone lives in redhouse, maryland, the highest total anywhere, 38 inches of snow. i need to see a ruler and picture of that. send it to my twitter account. >> we've got the call out there. and dillon dryer can make it back if she can because news vehicles are exempt from this ban so we'll see if she can get back in to new york city. good to know for everyone out there get home safely. i have new york congressman steve israel joining me by phone he's on long island. good to have you with me. explain what you're seeing. how bad is it where you are? >> well, we are just getting walloped. i tried to shovel my driveway. it's just absolutely futile.

and as i was shoveling all i could think about was that on christmas day in my congressional district on long island it was 70 degrees. now, less than a month later we're looking at what could be just an historic blizzard. and it looks like there's more to come. >> no. it's a great point a lot of people were wondering at christmas time where was the winter weather. now it has come upon us. and not to get into the hype of all this because we've gone through snowstorms and blizzards before along the eastern seaboard, but there is something a little different about this and especially this and the command and preparation that people are taking to make sure people are safe. especially when we talk about washington, d.c., sir, we know they don't always do the best with snow issues. when did you leave d.c.? >> well, the house of representatives has been on recess this week, so i actually left last week. i had to go to washington on thursday to give a speech on campaign finance reform to the brookings institution, and i just rushed to the airport to make sure i got a plane before the snow hit.

because had i not made it to that plane, it was very likely that i would be stranded in washington. >> we're looking at a shadow of the capitol, whiteout conditions from the camera shot we have right there. i know monday will be a day off as well. when do you expect to get back to work? what do you hear from colleagues? >> they had canceled votes on monday night. they told us to expect to have votes on tuesday. a decision has not yet been made whether the house will be in session tuesday, but if there is more snow i'm told that members may not be able to get back and we may not have votes on tuesday either. >> we know that connecticut has been a state affected by snow problems in the past where they have actually asked for federal funding. do you anticipate from anything that you're hearing from fellow congressional colleagues about certain districts that might actually need any type of federal help in the coming weeks and months? >> at this point, no. but, you know, my congressional district learned a painful lesson when we had hurricane sandy four years ago, and we had power outages.

we were not as prepared as we should have been to deal with that weather emergency. and so there's going to have to be assessment particularly if there is severe coastal flooding. what concerns me, my congressional district, which is a coastal district on long island, is we have high tide later today, tonight, that could cause some extreme flooding conditions. could create additional power outages, some infrastructure problems. i'm hopeful that we don't have to ask for federal resources. you know, new yorkers are pretty resilient. we learned some lessons from hurricane sandy. i think we're going to be okay. >> all right. you make a great point about the coastal flooding issue with the high tide aligned with the full moon this evening has a lot of people very interested to see what happens especially along the delmarva peninsula area and into new jersey as well. sir, thanks so much. congressman steve israel, best to you and your family. stay warm and safe. >> back to the driveway. thank you. >> thanks. so, how this snowstorm has fouled up plans for many

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welcome back, everybody. these are live picture of new york city, central park and we do have a mandatory travel ban about to take effect in roughly over a minute. we've got subways and buses. they're going to be out of service and the mayor, bill de blasio, warning anyone caught driving after this 2:30 cutoff can be fined or arrested, so this goes into effect for all nonemergency vehicles and it also comes as the snowfall totals in central park hover near 15 inches and show no sign of stopping anytime soon. here's a look at the george washington bridge approach. we got a few cars. you can make them out there in the snowy picture in the center left, but it's largely empty. and it's a sight you rarely ever see. it's unusually busy, always on a saturday. take a look at this baltimore, my hometown, snow is coming down in that city and it's not expected to let up anytime soon. meteorologist bill karins standing by with a complete look at where this storm is and how

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welcome back, everybody, i'm thomas roberts live in new york at msnbc world headquarters. thank you for joining me as we continue the breaking coverage about this powerful winter storm hitting the eastern seaboard of the u.s. here's a look at new york's times square and cars are officially supposed to be off the road if they are nonemergency vehicles. the mayor imposing a travel ban, and this started three minutes ago. it only covers new york city and nassau county roads as well as port authority crossings to new jersey. so, any commuter that's stopped on the roadways could be

arrested. also commuter trains in and out of the city will begin to shut down at 4:00 p.m. you have to imagine, though, that there's going to be a certain grace period here as that travel bans go into effect in new york city for folks trying to get off the road. but this is a look in washington, d.c., the nation's capital, at a standstill. heavy snow expected to continue this afternoon, and wind gusts of 40 miles per hour reducing visibility to near zero there. msnbc meteorologist bill karins joins me with this latest on this. this is one intense storm. >> an amazing storm. >> an the i-95 corridor hit the hardest. >> d.c. all the way to new york and even a little north of new york. go back to the times square shot. you are wondering only a couple of vehicles, that's not the big thing. but look at how many people are wandering around times square. what are all those people doing? a lot of those are tourists in new york city. all the broadway shows have been canceled for this afternoon and for this evening, so what are these people supposed to do? they're in their hotel rooms there's no mass transit and a lot of hotels in times square

and a lot of folks wandering in the blizzard either that or sitting in their hotel rooms. that's the way the pictures looks the way it does. and overnight the blizzard warnings will be dropped. we've had the heavy snow and low visibility but really no sustained winds to qualify this as a bluz ard, when it's all done in the textbooks it will be known as a nor'easter. new york city 26.9 the snowfall of record. 1998 we had 21. right now we're at 15 inches. so, only 6 inches to get to the top three of all-time. it will be close. we probably are going to get there. here's the radar. here's new york city here. the blue bands are where you pick up an inch or two an hour. the band to the northwest of new york city has to rotate through as we go through this evening. as the storm pulls away it's going to drag this band through new york city in the next couple hours that will produce a quick another three or four inches. this is going to be close. new york city should get a 20-inch snowfall out of this.

our computer estimates another ten inches in new york city. this goes back an hour or two so you would add seven or eight on top of what we had but the computer thinking we're get the 20-inch range and new haven will get thumped in the next couple hours philadelphia six inches more and trenton eight. further to the south we'll be dealing with the snow ending as we go through the next 12 hours or so especially washington, d.c.. washington, d.c., does not quite look like they'll get up to the 20-inch mark. it will be close. they've had 14 and 15 and it's slowed down a little bit, they may end up with 18 inches of snow but that's an amazing snowfall when you head into the beltway and a lot of areas outside of d.c. have seen significantly more. you can actually see, we're actually in a pretty good band right here. that's supposed to be the capitol dome, we were looking at the pictures earlier today and you could see it pretty well. i want to look at the radar for d.c., it looks impressive.

they must have filled in over the last couple minutminutes. and watch everything rotate down the bright white over the top of the capitol. produce another quick two to three inches of snow in the next hour, thomas, even in d.c. not done yet. >> not done yet. the mayor of new york city said it's getting bad rapidly and he started talking about data back in the 1800s and you think there's the potential to watch the 26-inch mark? >> 26 is going to be pushing it. >> okay. >> probably only maybe 10%, 15% chance of that, but getting into the 20-inch range i think there's a 75%, 80% chance of doing that. we'll probably end up around 23, 24 inches which new york city records almost 150 years and we're going to witness maybe number two or three on that list for snowstorms so that's history. we're watching it. we're part of it. >> pretty amazing. just so everybody remembers the

travel ban went into effect roughly seven minutes ago so we'll continue to watch that as the roads continue to lean out in new york city. a look at george washington bridge as those thoroughfares are about to close down. we turn our attention to philadelphia which was hit hard with 17 inches of snow in certain areas. >> reporter: thomas, behind me is the delaware river. usually nice and quiet, but it's very choppy. looks almost like an ocean because of that wind that's been so steady since early morning and even last night. the snow started falling yesterday afternoon. by this morning at 9:00 a.m. it was at 17 inches. pretty astonishing considering that initially we thought that we would get 18 inches total in philadelphia when all was said and done. but we still have some ten more hours of snow that's going to fall. i'm walking in maybe a into the and a half or two feet of snow. this is because of the wind that's pushing it up where i am.

but all around the city you're seeing these snowplows going up and down the primary roads doing a very good job. but they're so busy with those roads that the city says they may not even get to any of the residential areas, so that foot and a half or two feet of snow that's going to fall by the end of the day is just going to sit there until tomorrow when the city plows can get out and help out around the neighborhoods. otherwise, most people are staying off the streets. they're listening to the city officials. there haven't been many accidents to report. and, in fact, fortunately there's not a lot of lost power to report either. it's just that philadelphia's getting a lot more snow than they thought. and they're just riding it out. thomas? >> jacob, thanks so much. for more now on travel issues we're going to talk about the trains, how they're running and i'm joined by the spokesperson for amtrak. mike, good to have you with me. let's talk about the rail conditions. we've been focusing a lot attention on the airport delays.

what kind of delays or modified schedule interruptions are you seeing? >> sure, thomas. well, generally speaking we are carrying out our plan announced on thursday, with some delays and very light passenger loads. most of the ridership we are seeing is coming out of the boston area and it tends to lighten up the further south you get towards washington, d.c., where the ridership there is pretty small. but our saturday plan has held up pretty well. the plans for sunday were posted overnight on our website amtrak.com and we're continuing to monitor the situation and the weather is adjust our plans accordingly. >> when we talk about boston and folks heading south, a lot of people refer to this from washington north as the acela corridor, so, how have you been keeping a close eye on those tracks because we know the i-95 corridor is really what's been walloped the most by this storm system? >> it has. what we've been doing really is it's in our -- to our advantage to run trains because that actually keeps the rails clear

and allows our trains to come through and once conditions do warrant, we're able to quickly ramp up our service back to full service levels. but we're looking at our trainloads. looking at our passenger loads, and we're responding to the demand that we have. we're here. we're serving our passengers and we're operating safely as possible. >> when you talk about that, the safety issues that go along with it, as you say, trains running on the tracks is actually a good thing to stay operational, so you guys can make it through pretty tough conditions, or are at least operating through pretty tough conditions. >> we can. that's a credit to our employees to our staff who are keeping the rails clear. it's to our advantage to run the trains that you can. we're certainly not running as many trains and in some cases slowing down when we need to. but we've got great staff out there making sure we're getting to the destinations as safely as possible. >> we can imagine with the flight delays people are turning

to amtrak for help. thank you, sir. >> got it. the wimt erwinter storm has professional sports team to reschedule teams but in charlotte the game is still on for the panther hosting the arizona cardinals for the conference championships. and sara, the stadium's going to be ready, and let's talk about transportation. is that going to be an issue for the fans? actually, i'm encouraged because i see blue skies behind you. >> reporter: yeah, believe it or not, we'll see some blue skies today, some tomorrow. let's give you a birds-eye view from our drone. look at that gorgeous shot of the charlotte uptown skyline and the clouds breaking to give us some blue sky. you can see the roads, they mostly look clear but here, thomas, is where the problem is going to come, here's where the danger is going to come in. we've got a lot of water on the road because the sun came out and started to melt the ice and snow. temperatures will drop back down again after sunset and all that water it has the potential to be black ice.

the preparations that crews have put down in anticipation of this storm, the salt and things like that, those all washed away because we had rains that came before the snow, so there's not a lot of treatment on that road even though they continue to dump salt and to dump brine, you know, they're fighting a battle against ice melting and training off and putting it back on the road so the black ice is going to be a major factor. the other thing the crews are dealing with this hour is restoring power to about 112,000 home in the north carolina area some of the northern counties being the hardest hit here, there are six deaths in the state attributed to weather-related deaths they activated national guardsmen to go to cars that were stuck on the side of the road or appeared to be abandoned. check those cars out and make sure that no one was inside. now, as you mentioned a lot of the focus here is shifting to tomorrow's game. it's a big game the panthers taking on the cardinals. they actually played in the snow yesterday and they think fans are going to be out. they think they're going to come

out and tailgate and enjoy the game. there is another game happening today the duke/north carolina state basketball game and that game is going ahead of schedule but a very different request for fans, thomas, they're actually asking fans to stay away to don't come down to the stadium, watch it from home and stay off the roads tonight. back to you. >> everybody's got to check out the status of what they want to do, thanks so much for the update. we like seeing the blue skies behind you. thanks. we want to depart from the storm coverage for a moment to bring you developing news a story from presidential politics. donald trump in iowa drawing criticism for a comment he just made at a rally event. kerry sanders is in pella, iowa, where trump will hold a second of two events later today. kerry, explain what happened. >> reporter: well, he'll be here at central college a short period of time but earlier today he was in sioux city, iowa, as you know he's very confident that the people who are supporting him are very strong

in their support and we do see that at the rallies, large numbers of people, here today 500 people inside, overflow crowd will have to go somewhere else. they've been standing out here for six hours in the cold and, i mean, the temperatures are in the teens, so he does have that following and in sioux city, iowa, some might have said he had brag dosh sha ia going on, little brash, but here's what he had to say about the supporters who would follow him anywhere. >> i could stand in the middle of fifth avenue and shoot somebody and i wouldn't lose any voters. >> i sent you -- >> reporter: so that's clearly got some people paying close attention -- [ inaudible ] -- >> so, unfortunately we lost kerry's audio there. we'll work on getting that back and we'll get back to kerry as soon as we do. we apologize for that. kerry sanders reporting in iowa for us. back to our storm coverage, though, because we have roads across the eastern coastline simply a mess with thousands of

accidents from the mid-atlantic to the east coast. coming up next dillon dryer will join us live from the road as she travels back from new york city with a look at what conditions are like as she goes north. ♪jake reese, "day to feel alive"♪ ♪jake reese, "day to feel alive"♪ ♪jake reese, "day to feel alive"♪ they represent blood cells. and if you have afib-an irregular heartbeat that may put you at five times greater risk of stroke they can pool together in the heart, forming a clot that can break free and travel upstream to the brain,

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new video to show you now from a national guard humvee patrolling the streets of washington, d.c., in the wake of the massive snowstorm that hit the nation's capital. we have the mayor of washington saying people should not be driving or walking in the streets and she's encouraging people to stay home. stay safe. nbc meteorologist dylan dreyer is actually on the road heading back into new york city. she's been traveling from virginia, through d.c. and onward, so how is the situation

changed for you as you've been seeing everything from the roads? >> reporter: well, hey, thomas, you know, i would say that this is probably the worst it's been the entire trip. we started off in washington, d.c., at 7:30 this morning and we are just outside of secaucus, new jersey, still on the new jersey turnpike approaching new york city. we're really hoping that our press plates get us through the tunnel, you know, we having press plates does allow us to be on the roads because the service we are offering people is showing you what the condition are like outside so nobody thinks that it's okay to go outside. so, the roads are very much snow covered. the turnpike it's been in and out, but the last, i'd say, 20 miles has been pretty miserable because the snow is coming down at a pretty good rate as this storm continues to intensify and we're seeing those snowfall rates of about 2 inches per hour so we are getting closer to the lincoln tunnel into the city and once we get into the city we expect not many other people on the roads because the travel ban

is now in effect started at 2:30 and now it's time for everyone to be off the roads and just stay indoors and stay safe, so we'll see what happens as we get closer. we're still a little bit aways but we've got some pretty miserable conditions to get through before we get there, thomas. >> i believe in you. i think you can do it, as you say you've got the press pass that will. you get through. but when it comes to salt trucks, police or first responders, what have you seen over, say, the last 30 minutes? >> reporter: over the last 30 minutes we haven't seen that many trucks out here plowing the streets. it's interesting driving along the new jersey turnpike they have cement trucks that have plows on the front of them and that's what's been clearing the roads and, you know, when you get stuck behind one of those convoys of trucks that are plowing the roads, the conditions are great for a while, but then they exit and then you're stuck in the slop once again. the good news is we've seen maybe just a couple other vehicles on the roads and unfortunately we've also seen those vehicles eventually end up

on the side of the road just kind of spun out. you just get stuck in these ditches in snow in the road and you just can't get control. we've been going a steady 25, 30 miles per hour so we've been slow and steady that's why we've on the road for almost seven hours. it's not a seven-hour drive from d.c. normally so it's been a long, slow drive. >> no, you and the crew that have been doing this you are troupers, we definitely appreciate your reporting. are you going to take the washington bridge or the lincoln tunnel, do you know? >> reporter: it's been windy over the bridges that's for sure with the wind gusts. we'll take the lincoln tunnel and see what blacktop looks for a little while. the snow is getting a little blinding and mesmerizing a little bit. we need to wake everybody up and see some blacktop. >> safe travels and thank you to you and the crew doing all the driving there. the blizzard is big buzz on social media. four-legged friends getting in on the fun, too, uploading some

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why fit in, when you were born to stand out? the 2016 nissan altima has arrived. welcome back, msnbc senior editor for digital and media content cal pearry joins me with the best from social media. what do you got? >> first let me give you the turnpike, having mass. and scott kelly from the international space station caught this. this is snow thunder. i've never seen it from space, who has. breaking the internet today is the panda at the national zoo. not a lot to say here. my anchor man moment. someone giving it a run for their money this is in new jersey, who is shoveling with his hover board. probably not the safest thing to

do in the world but there you are. i know we're snowed in at 30 rock. there's lots of places worse than 30 rock to be snowed into. there you go, the buck showalter gnome downtown baltimore. >> thank you very much. thanks. stick us with msnbc live, we'll continue with the winter storm right after this and bill karins with the latest storms and snow totals and we've got the latest on new york's travel ban that just went into effect. back after this. a. right under this tree. ♪ (man) some things are worth holding onto. they're hugging the tree. (man) that's why we got a subaru. or was it that tree? (man) the twenty-sixteen subaru outback. love. it's what makes a subaru, a subaru.

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good afternoon, everybody, i'm thomas roberts. we continue our breaking news coverage of the east coast blizzard right here. and here's what we know right now at the top of the hour a full travel ban is in effect for new york. it went into effect 30 minutes ago. we have new york governor andrew cuomo ordering that into effect and the order means that all bridges and tunnel into america's largest city from new jersey are closed. any portion of a train line that